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The next deadly virus that spreads around the world could easily come from a bat that roosts in or around the caves being explored by Thiago Bernardi Vieira.
Driven by conditions including deforestation and other incursions by humans on bat habitats, these Brazilian jump zones have grown by more than 40% in extent over the past two decades – over 2.5 times faster than similarly risky areas worldwide, Reuters found. Almost three-quarters of Brazil's jump zones lie within the Amazon, a tangle of biodiversity that holds more secrets than scientists can ever hope to discover, especially with swaths of the rainforest quickly succumbing to development.
These smaller species are reservoirs of contagious diseases that can lead to pandemics.
But these two hunters in the Congo Basin region were part of a groundbreaking initiative that granted their village control of 37,000 acres of forest, enabling them to protect the land from the most destructive hunting, logging and farming practices that increase the risk of zoonotic infection.
If replicated worldwide alongside other protected areas, such systems of local control could help counter another catastrophic spillover event.
Hunting in healthy ecosystems is not risk-free - all animals carry viruses, not least primates whose genetic similarity to humans makes exposure risky. But hunting in disrupted habitats increases the likelihood of encountering the most pestilent animals.